Rugby's 12-game league winning streak ends

Leigh-Anne Brown Arizona Daily Wildcat Danny Shields (11) grabs the ball and breaks through UCSB's defensive line. While the game was close the whole time, the Wildcats lost 17-19 to Santa Barbara.

That's all that separated Arizona from its thirteenth consecutive league victory.

Unfortunately, the Wildcat Rugby team never got those two points and lost Friday to UC Santa Barbara, 19-17.

It only took two days for the team to redeem itself in a 27-10 win yesterday over Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, a team that earlier in the season defeated UCSB by one point.

"We did two things different today rather than on Friday," UA head coach Dave Sitton said. "We executed our game plan better, and we had a better game plan. Our game plan gave us a better open attack which lead to good field position and more momentum."

UA, (4-1, 1-1), opened the scoring on a field goal by Zack Harrison about nine minutes into the game.

Cal Poly SLO struck back late in the half with the first try of the game to lead 7-3.

After a seesaw scoring first half, the game was tied at 10 with 40 minutes left to play until UA exploded in the second half.

Offensive efforts from Al Lakomskis, Danny Shields, John Shumway, and Chris Kron helped the Wildcats score 17 points.

"I think this was a do or die situation for us," Kron said. "The guys knew we had to win or our playoff hopes were over. We gained experience from Friday to today and our first game jitters were out of us."

UA's second-half scoring started with Lakomskis flipping the ball to Shumway, who took it in from 10 yards out for a try.

The scoring ended after Kron, who failed to score on long runs twice, finally got in, after outrunning the entire Cal Poly defense on a 60-yard try.

"I think in rugby it is hard to always know where you are on the field," Kron said. "Maybe some of the other times I should have just taken it in rather than passing, but the last one I didn't see anyone so I just ran for the goal line and got in."

UA continues its season with a pair of home games Saturday at the Domino's Invitational at Estevan Park.